*Editor’s note: K-VIBE invites experts from various K-culture sectors to share their extraordinary discovery about the Korean culture. 

[Larger Than Architecture] Chapter 1. This World We Live In 

Ep. 6. Erotic Songs

 

By Kim Won (Master K-architect)

The Samguk Yusa includes a story about the monk Wonhyo and his song involving the "molga-bu" (a handle-less axe). One day, Wonhyo appeared on the main street of Seorabeol and sang:

 

"Who will lend me a handle-less axe,

So I can carve a pillar to support the heavens."

 

No one understood the meaning of the song until King Taejong heard it and interpreted it as Wonhyo seeking a noblewoman to bear a wise child who would become a pillar of the nation. He instructed that Wonhyo be taken to Princess Yoseok. Upon meeting the officials sent to escort him, Wonhyo intentionally fell into the water at Muncheon Bridge, using the excuse of drying his soaked monk's robes to stay at Princess Yoseok's palace. Eventually, Princess Yoseok gave birth to Seol Chong. In this context, the handle-less axe symbolizes a woman's sexual organ, and carving the pillar represents sexual union.

 

Another erotic song is the "Seodongyo," a hyangga attributed to the childhood of King Mu of Baekje. If we accept its association with King Jinpyeong of Silla, it dates before 599 AD:

 

"Princess Seonhwa,

secretly adores

Seodong (Sweet Potato Boy),

and goes to embrace him at night."

 

In this song, "eoreodugo" (to adore secretly) implies sexual relations, similar to "eorida" meaning to engage in intercourse.

 

A more explicit erotic hyangga is the "Cheoyongga," familiar to many:

 

"In the bright moonlight of Gyeongju,

strolling late into the night,

I returned to find,

four legs in my bed.

Two are mine, whose are the other two?

Originally mine,

but how can I retrieve what's been taken?"

 

This song dates back to the reign of King Heongang of Silla (875-885 AD).

 

Around the same period, a similar erotic song appeared in Japan's "Manyoshu." The interpretation of one such poem by Lee Young-hee using idu script reads:

 

"Do not rotate or roll the phallus,

know a bit between the large thighs,

oh, the phallus is erect,

let us go back and forth below the female organ."

 

Lee Young-hee’s analysis of songs and texts, such as those found in the "Man'y

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